If this is your first visit, be sure to
check out the FAQ by clicking the
link above. You may have to register
before you can post: click the register link above to proceed. To start viewing messages,
select the forum that you want to visit from the selection below.

F-111A Sim pics

Hi All,

Well I finally was granted rights to make posts into this forum. I've been trying to do this for months, ever since I found this forum. I hope you all enjoy the pics.

These were taken in 1978 or maybe 79. This was the Mt Home AFB flight sim shop. There were two f-111 sims here at the time. I'm the one one at the console and in the cockpit. It was lots of fun to be able to fly these sims just about whenever I wanted to fly. There were several rows of cabinets, I want to say maybe 6 or 8 rows, that contained the circuitry to run this beast. It was all IFR as there wasn't a visual system on them during my tour. But it was still fun to fly. I got pretty good at it just by the crash and burn to learn method.

I love those link trainers. My favorite has always been the AST, solid, logical, and straight forward.

While assisting a CAE engineer during a mod he said they can't get their new engineers to learn the classic architecture, all these new guys are interested in is making it look " Gee Whiz" rather than pratical.

I have worked on a wide variety of sims (never a flight safety though) and I have watched the de-evolution of the CAE machines. By trying to look clever they have continued to take steps backward from the AST .....>>> ... MST ...... Classic (which is a good design) ......>>> ... Sim XXI .. and beyond. Each worse.
They sold the Advanced XXI system with the idea that everything was USB and plug and play. The buyers thought it was oh so clever, hot swap cards, less interruption to training etc. Except yes they were USB, but they were also inventoried by the "hosts" which meant sure you can hot swap a card, but you then had to flash it, and update the host database blah blah blah. What should have been a unload, power down a chassis, swap a card and reload ( 10-15 min.) became a nightmare, find the laptop, find the right flash program, update the host with the new cards personal id, reload ...... Not to mention the fact that you no longer have one host, so if you want to look at a variable you can do it from any node, but should you want to change it well, first you have to figure out which of the hosts "owns" that label, fucking retarded.

Also, with the AST you can troubleshoot down to component level very easily, try that on one of the new models. It seems the technicians are becoming obsolete, I got that feeling when they hired a manager of rib crib, with no electronic or software experience and made him a Tech 2.... It is very telling of what management really thinks about talent, apparently it is not needed.

I thought I got out of simulation for good in 95, but being a dumbass I went back in 2000. Not this time.

I love those link trainers. My favorite has always been the AST, solid, logical, and straight forward.

While assisting a CAE engineer during a mod he said they can't get their new engineers to learn the classic architecture, all these new guys are interested in is making it look " Gee Whiz" rather than pratical.

I have worked on a wide variety of sims (never a flight safety though) and I have watched the de-evolution of the CAE machines. By trying to look clever they have continued to take steps backward from the AST .....>>> ... MST ...... Classic (which is a good design) ......>>> ... Sim XXI .. and beyond. Each worse.
They sold the Advanced XXI system with the idea that everything was USB and plug and play. The buyers thought it was oh so clever, hot swap cards, less interruption to training etc. Except yes they were USB, but they were also inventoried by the "hosts" which meant sure you can hot swap a card, but you then had to flash it, and update the host database blah blah blah. What should have been a unload, power down a chassis, swap a card and reload ( 10-15 min.) became a nightmare, find the laptop, find the right flash program, update the host with the new cards personal id, reload ...... Not to mention the fact that you no longer have one host, so if you want to look at a variable you can do it from any node, but should you want to change it well, first you have to figure out which of the hosts "owns" that label, fucking retarded.

Also, with the AST you can troubleshoot down to component level very easily, try that on one of the new models. It seems the technicians are becoming obsolete, I got that feeling when they hired a manager of rib crib, with no electronic or software experience and made him a Tech 2.... It is very telling of what management really thinks about talent, apparently it is not needed.

I thought I got out of simulation for good in 95, but being a dumbass I went back in 2000. Not this time.

Hi All,
Well I finally was granted rights to make posts into this forum....

Wow! Thanks for the pictures. I was a Nav/Bomb Simulator (AFSC 34350) Tech at Nellis AFB from '68 to '72 on the F-111A sim (we had 3, plus an egress trainer). I was in 7th Heaven, what with Las Vegas, the Thunderbirds and spending most of my time flying the simulator . I never took pictures, but really glad you posted these.